CultureFoundry helps Indigenous communities keep their languages alive, but their platform had some major roadblocks:
🔹 Students lost interest after a couple of months.
🔹 Teachers struggled to manage lessons and track progress.
🔹 The app was hard to update, making long-term improvements difficult.
I redesigned the platform to keep students engaged and make it easier for teachers to support them. My work included:
✅ Adding XP points, badges, and profiles to keep students motivated.
✅ Giving teachers better tools to track progress, edit lessons, and manage classes.
✅ Making the platform scalable so CultureFoundry could expand to more communities.
🚀 Now, more students stay engaged, teachers can work more efficiently, and the platform is set up to grow.
Problem
Saving Languages is Hard
CultureFoundry wanted to help Indigenous communities keep their languages alive by making learning fun. But the platform didn't feel fun. It felt like a thing to get use to and not something easy to use. Plus, they were in the process of expanding the platform to offer more languages and allow for more courses to be created and customized by teachers but it wasn't ready for that yet.
They needed a design that was easy to maintain, fun to use, and worked well for everyone—students, teachers, and schools.
Make Learning Fun
Reflect reward systems implemented by teachers in their classrooms to keep learners engaged.
Give teachers more control
Redesign the hub where teachers and organization admins can do their jobs seamlessly.
My Solution
Make learning more fun so students stay motivated
Learners can track their progress with an XP bar and engage in challenging versions of their learning activities which motivates them to out-compete themselves or their classmates.
Collect Badges
Learners can earn badges to mark their achievements on the platform and revel in their success, keeping them vested in the platform.
Make Profiles
Learners can now customize their profile by choosing their avatar and their clan further integrating themselves on the platform. Plus potentially leaving room for further online interactions.
Teachers can now…
Research
My Research Method
1️⃣ Talked to users (students, teachers, schools, and course creators) to understand their needs.
2️⃣ Sorted users into groups and designed different experiences for each.
Learners
Students, mostly first nation as well as some not, ranged from age 6 to adult all with varying degree of experience with a first nation’s language.
Pain Points:
❌ Learning a language is hard and boring cause you got to do it consistently.
❌ It's hard to stay motivated.
Teachers
Mostly working in public K-12, these teachers come in short supply and most don’t have a fluent understanding of a first nation’s language.
Pain Points:
❌ No access to indigenous curriculum.
❌ Outnumbered and lack free time to research.
Org. Admins.
These folks administrate whole organizations like schools to ensure the relationship between teachers and students is running smoothly.
Pain Points:
❌ Stretched thin with other priorities.
❌ Often has no time to learn new software or applications.
Course Creators
Course creators make the curriculum and courses for the platform. These folks work with the operations team and address course feedback.
Pain Points:
❌ Working on power point or other tools not meant for course creation.
❌ A long and tedious workflow
💡Key Result: Sorting users into groups helped CultureFoundry better understand who their users are and where their needs to be met.
My Impact
🚀 Students now stay motivated with XP points, badges, and profiles.
🚀 Teachers can easily track progress, edit lessons, and manage classes.
🚀 Schools can support teachers and students without extra hassle.
🚀 The platform is now scalable and ready to grow.
Looking back
My time at CultureFoundry was truly enriching. I got to contribute and practice my eye for design to a product that I believe to be doing a very needed good. I am particularly very grateful to members of the Anishinaabe as I feel I've gained an entirely new perspective through our 1-1 interviews.
This project strongly solidified my passion for using design to create transformative experiences that impact lives and empower communities.
